Reading time: 12 min There is an enormous marine carnivore which grows as long as a bus, and most people are fully unaware of its very existence. Nearly everyone knows sperm whales, but if you would ask people about the world’s next largest extant predator (if we exclude baleen whales which are still carnivorous and sometimes surprisingly predatory), it’s…
The feathered Warsaw Dilophosaurus
Reading time: 4 min Originally I wanted to continue the series about the Messel-fossils, but I am still working on a reconstruction illustration for the next part and needed a break. Instead I´ll jump on the Dilophosaurus bandwagon, because this awesome theropod from the Early Jurassic is just big in the news, and it´s a good excuse to finally…
Fossil treasures of Messel Pit part II: Crocs and gators
Reading time: 5 min The fauna of the area which would later become the Messel pit was quite rich in crocs. Some of them strongly resembled modern crocodylians, but some of them were oddballs which differed strongly from any extant species. The big reptile showcase of the Messel exhibition in the Senckenberg Museum at Frankfurt The biggest crocodylian of…
Fossil treasures of Messel pit part I: Fish
Reading time: 8 min The Messel pit is one of the most spectacular fossil sites of the world. It gives us an incredible insight into a subtropical ecosystem from the Eocene, about 47 million years ago. The special conditions of this Lagerstätte did not only preserve the bones of the animals which lived in and around a deep crater…
The weird little whales that hide within a cloud of their gut fluid
Reading time: 5 min Many animals have developed amazing anti-predator adaptions, from mimicry to the ability to autotomize certain parts of their own bodies. One of the most bizarre defense mechanisms among mammals is found in the two exant members of the genus Kogia, the pygmy sperm whale (Kogia breviceps) and the dwarf sperm whale (Kogia sima). This dolphin-sized…
Markus‘ Wünsche an den Designer
Reading time: < 1 min bei den Farbe neige ich nach wie vor zu natürlichen Tönen, grünlich oder vielleicht auch etwas gelblich (zum Beispiel Plattenkalk als Hintergrund) mal was ganz anderes, wie ließe sich diese Rekonstruktion von Olaus Magnus´ Wunderkammer im Hintergrund einfügen?